


The case of the cheese shortage

by dafna



Category: Miss Marple - Agatha Christie
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-18 11:09:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21843133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dafna/pseuds/dafna
Summary: “It’s a mistake that city people often make,” Miss Marple said, “to say that nothing happens in villages like St. Mary Mead.”
Comments: 33
Kudos: 95
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	The case of the cheese shortage

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Orichalxos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Orichalxos/gifts).
  * Translation into Русский available: [Дело о нехватке сыра](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27777259) by [Bat_out_of_hell](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bat_out_of_hell/pseuds/Bat_out_of_hell)



“It’s a mistake that city people often make,” Miss Marple said, “to say that nothing happens in villages like St. Mary Mead.”

She smiled at her nephew Raymond in a way that he had grown to know meant he was about to be politely condescended to. His friend Edgar, long eager to meet his “notorious aunt,” had less experience and thus blundered on with his question.

“Oh, I didn’t mean St. Mary Mead,” he said. “From what Raymond says, you’re positively tripping over bodies every day here. But surely you’d agree that most villages are rather more quiet?”

Miss Marple raised an eyebrow and finished a row of her knitting before replying.

“Oh, St. Mary Mead is as quiet as the next place,” she said. “But that’s very different from an absence of action. Things do happen, because people are people and just as likely to be silly or wicked here as anywhere.”

Dolly Bantry, who had dropped by to return a book on Welsh hedgerows and stayed to enjoy tea and the company from London, looked over at Raymond. They had both heard this speech before.

“The difference,” Miss Marple continued, “is that in town there’s so much noise and fuss and activity that it’s only the very loud actions that get noticed. But in a small village, we’re able to listen more attentively.”

“What my aunt is saying, Edgar,” Raymond said, “is that you’d be better off killing someone in a large town than in a small village.”

“I am _not_ saying that, my dear.”

Raymond continued, unbothered. “In a city, who notices anyone? Good luck to the copper trying to find out where you were after 3 p.m. on the day your great-uncle finally pops off and leaves you everything just before he was about to change the will. But in a small town, the butcher will have noticed you walking down a street he’s never seen you in before and the milkman will report that you put out one fewer bottles that day and it will all end in tears and a judge wearing a black cap.”

“We really don’t have that many murders hereabout,” Dolly protested.

“Oh no,” Miss Marple agreed. “Though as Raymond said, they do seem to get caught more often here. But most of the things that happen are quite ordinary, really. Why, only this morning ...”

Raymond, Edgar and Dolly all leaned in.

“Dear me, I think I dropped a stitch.”

Raymond sighed heavily.

“What was I saying? Oh yes, this morning,” Miss Marple said. “Well, it started with Tom, the grocer’s boy. He brought our regular order from Mr. Baker but told Ann — she’s my new girl, you met her when you came in — he told Ann that we’d have to wait a few days for the cheese, as they’d run out.”

“He told my girl that as well,” said Dolly. “But I’m not sure I see ...”

“Oh, on its own, I agree,” said Miss Marple. “Shortages do happen, and of course Mr. Baker has always gotten his cheese from the Ferringstow dairy, which is the other side of Market Basing and even with the roads so much better now than they used to be, a rainy day can make all the difference.”

“Has it rained recently?” Raymond was reasonably sure that it hadn't rained, but not sure enough not to check. If it was possible for it to have rained somewhere and only one person had noticed, that person was his aunt.

Miss Marple nodded at him, pleased. “As you say, it's been quite dry for the season, really. But even so, it’s all still only what one would call suggestive. It wasn’t until Griselda dropped by just before lunch that I realized what the cheese had been about.”

“Griselda is married to the vicar,” Raymond explained to Edgar. “Much younger than him too.”

“Oh hush,” said Dolly. “They’re lovely.”

“At any rate,” Miss Marple continued, “she wanted to know if I could host tomorrow’s bring-and-buy sale on my own as she’s been called to town unexpectedly. I said I could, of course, and she explained that she’d wanted to ask Mary Elmtree —”

“The old biddy up in the big hall,” said Raymond. Dolly settled for glaring at him.

“But that Mary couldn’t do it because she had her husband’s niece and her whole family down for the weekend.”

“Ah,” said Edgar, trying to get into the spirit of things. “So this Mrs. Elmtree had ordered extra cheese for her visitors from your grocer and that’s why he was out?”

“Oh, no,” said Miss Marple. “Mrs. Elmtree hasn’t shopped with Mr. Baker for, oh, it must be at least five years now.”

"There was an incident over a monthly bill," Dolly explained. "Either it was lost and not paid, or it was most definitely paid and _then_ lost, if you see what I mean. Unkind things were said by everyone, plus of course this was when Mrs. Elmtree's nephew was visiting and he had definite and very loud opinions on pretty much everything."

Raymond patted Edgar’s knee, consolingly.

"Anyway," Dolly continued, "the Elmtrees send their man to the grocer in Much Benham instead."

“But it still all connects,” Miss Marple said. “Because it hasn’t rained either. And I had a letter just yesterday from Doris, who used to work for me. She’s now at a draper’s in Market Basing, and if anything had happened to the Ferringstows, she would have been sure to let me know. She knows how much I like their blue rind.”

Dolly, who knew Jane Marple by far the best of her entranced audience, nodded, catching on.

“I see. So if everything’s all right at the Ferringstows, and the roads are fine, it does look queer that Mr. Baker should happen to run out of cheese at the same time as Mary Elmstree is buying up the cheese supply of Much Benham.”

“Exactly, my dear.” Miss Marple smiled. She put down her knitting and picked up her teacup.

“You think Mr. Baker has been secretly buying his cheese from the grocer at Much Benham,” Dolly concluded.

“Well, don’t you?” Miss Marple said. “Which leads us to the mystery at the heart of the matter.”

Raymond leaned in further, his teacup balanced precariously.

“Why is this happening?" his aunt asked, simply. "When we know that, we shall have a real story."

Edgar held his breath. Raymond was more impatient.

"Well, what's the answer? Don't keep us in suspense."

"Oh, I don't know yet," Miss Marple said, to groans of disappointment from her audience. "I mean, I did only find out today that Mr. Baker is no longer buying from the Ferringstows."

She took another sip of her tea before setting it aside. "I have my theories, of course."

"The time at the fete with the stall," Dolly said knowingly.

Miss Marple nodded. "Also, possibly the daughter's involved somehow. I'll know more in a day or so, I expect."

Raymond waited for any of this to be explained.

“My dear aunt Jane,” he said finally. “All that and the mystery is why your grocer changed his cheese supplier?”

“I mean, I did warn you,” said Miss Marple. “There are far fewer violent crimes in St. Mary Mead than you make it seem."

She picked up her knitting again and smiled at her visitors.

"Sometimes, the story really is only about cheese.”


End file.
